How to play Peerkle
Peerkle gives you eight items and a named axis — say "Rank these mammals by average sleep hours, low to high." Your job is to put the eight items in the correct order along that axis. You have five attempts.
After each attempt, every slot returns one of three glyphs:
- ● — that item is in the correct slot.
- ◐ — that item is one slot away from where it belongs.
- ○ — that item is two or more slots away.
All three glyphs encode position distance, never the underlying value. You learn how close you got at each rung, but never the actual numbers behind the axis until you either solve the puzzle or run out of attempts.
On the first attempt, tap an item in the bank to pick it, then tap an empty slot to drop it in. Once all eight are placed and you submit, the items stay where you put them — for every following attempt the bank is empty and you iterate in place: tap one slot to select it, tap a different slot to swap them, or tap the same slot a second time to send that item back to the bank. With a hardware keyboard, the number keys 1 through 8 jump straight to a slot, the arrow keys move between slots, Backspace sends the focused slot's item back to the bank, and Enter selects, swaps, or sends to bank — the same as tapping.
The twist
"Higher or lower" puzzles show two items at a time and ask a binary judgment. "Globle" and "Worldle" rank along a single fixed dimension — geographic distance — with directional feedback. Connections groups items but doesn't order them. None of these ask for a full simultaneous ordering of eight items along a fresh axis each day, with per-position Mastermind-style feedback.
Peerkle does. Each puzzle teaches you a fact-set (the items' true values along the axis) and the deduction style (use this attempt's feedback to compose the next one). The eight items don't change between attempts — what changes is what you know about where each one belongs.
Strategy
- Iterate, don't restart. Each attempt starts from your previous one. Tap two slots to swap; tap one slot twice to send it back to the bank if you want to rearrange more aggressively. Items you got right (●) should usually stay where they are.
- Anchor the extremes first. The items you're surest about are usually the ones at the ends of the axis. Lock those in early; the middle is where the work is.
- Read the glyphs as a constraint solver. A ● means that slot is done — don't move it. A ○ tells you the item is at least two rungs from home. Two ○ glyphs adjacent to each other often means a pair of items wants to swap somewhere bigger than one slot.
- Use the duplicate-attempt rejection. Resubmitting the same order doesn't cost you a try. Take that as licence to think — rearrange one or two items at a time and reason about the predicted feedback before you commit.
- Don't burn an attempt on a wild guess. Five attempts is generous if you reason; tight if you guess. The first attempt should already use what you can figure out from common knowledge of the axis.
Worked example
Suppose today's axis is "Rank these countries by population, low to high" and the items
are Iceland, Ireland, Switzerland, Spain, Mexico, Japan, USA, India. You guess and the
feedback row is ● ◐ ○ ◐ ○ ● ○ ●.
Slots 1, 6 and 8 are ● — you nailed the smallest country, the sixth-largest, and the largest. Slots 2 and 4 are ◐ — those items are off by exactly one. Slots 3, 5 and 7 are ○ — those three are at least two rungs from home. Now you know: don't move the three correct items; consider swapping each ◐ with its neighbour; rearrange the three ○ items more aggressively. Compose the next attempt from there.
Frequently asked questions
How do I play Peerkle on mobile?
On the first attempt, tap an item in the bank then tap an empty slot to drop it in. After you submit, the bank is empty and the items stay where you placed them: tap one slot to select it, tap another to swap them, or tap the same slot twice to send that item back to the bank. The whole game fits comfortably on a 375px-wide screen — the ladder runs vertically, and the bank flows below as a row of pills.
What time does Peerkle reset?
Every puzzle is pinned to 00:00 UTC, so the whole world plays the same Peerkle on the same date.
What do the glyphs mean?
● means the item is in the right slot. ◐ means it's one slot away. ○ means it's two or more slots away. The glyphs only encode how close you are by position, never by value — you don't learn the underlying numbers until you win or the answer is revealed.
Why doesn't Peerkle tell me how far off I am numerically?
Because that would leak the axis. The whole point is to think about ordering with the fact-set you already carry — saying "off by 12 sleep hours" would hand you the units mid-puzzle. Position distance is the only feedback channel.
More MinCalc games
Enjoyed Peerkle? Try Toadle — a four-letter word puzzle where each guess returns one number — or Quackle, a calm pond-logic puzzle, or Sumrex, where you place one digit per row, column, and colour region so they add up.